


and there will be no grand choirs to sing

by Wanderingchronicle



Series: no choir [7]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Bathing, Cuddling, Developing Relationship, Did I say Cuddles, Established Relationship, M/M, Mollymauk Tealeaf Would Like You To Bind Safely, Mollymauk lives, Trans Male Character, hair-washing, shameless fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-30
Updated: 2018-12-30
Packaged: 2019-09-30 13:26:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,533
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17224895
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wanderingchronicle/pseuds/Wanderingchronicle
Summary: Molly and Caleb decompress after a particularly messy battle.





	and there will be no grand choirs to sing

**Author's Note:**

> So this is the last installment of no choir, y'all! I can't believe it. I hope this ends things on a satisfactory note.
> 
> This fic, and the series as a whole, are named for the Florence and the Machine song "No Choir."

__ “And it's hard to write about being happy, 'cause the older I get  
__ I find that happiness is an extremely uneventful subject  
__ And there would be no grand choirs to sing  
__ No chorus could come in  
__ About two people sitting doing nothing  
_ But I must confess, I did it all for myself  
_ __ I gathered you here to hide from some vast, unnameable fear...”

\--

By the time Caleb has finished closing the door behind him, Molly has already divested himself of all his clothes and is in the process of levering himself into one of the series of pools set into the floor with a relieved sigh. The water has already turned very pale pink, and has a couple of suspect-looking lumps floating in it.

“Molly,” Caleb says tiredly, “I have to rinse myself off in that too.”

Molly grins at him toothily. “Well, chop chop then, before I contaminate this water even more thoroughly with blood and sewage.”

With a long-suffering sigh, Caleb sheds his jacket and carefully removes his book holsters, placing them in the provided racks for clothing before also removing his boots, shirt, trousers, handwraps, binder, and smallclothes. By the time he reaches the pool, Molly has started to pick sadly at the matts in his dark-purple hair, tail twitching anxiously.

The water is still mostly translucent, and Caleb can clearly see the round, silvery scar on Molly’s chest. It’s an ugly reminder of how easy any one of the Nein is to lose, regardless of the fact they they got Molly back. He can’t stop himself from wanting to run into the thick of battle every time he sees Molly get hurt, can’t stop himself from wanting to call fire to his fingertips and destroy anyone who would put Molly back in a grave.

But here, now, they are alive, rinsing off their last battle in the most expensive bathing experience Zadash could offer them, and Molly is making a valiant effort to initiate a game of footsie under the water, tail switching back and forth playfully.

Caleb ducks under the water, trying to ease out the worst of the grime with his fingers, then rises up and jerks his chin at the next pool, which is steaming and has a little basket of soaps and bath oils and a comb sitting next to it. “Finished rinsing?” he queries, watching Mollymauk’s face light up when he notices the contents of the basket.

“Yes,” Mollymauk says emphatically, hauling his wet form out of the rinsing pool and slithering immediately into the second pool with a splash. Caleb snorts, watching Molly flail around under the water for a moment before he surfaces, grinning, and puts his hand out.

Caleb pulls himself up onto the rim of the bath, swings his legs over into the second pool, then allows himself to be pulled into the water, which is blessedly warm and clean. Molly grins up at him, pressing a delicate kiss to his nose, then turns around to investigate the bath oils, uncorking them one by one and giving them interested sniffs.

After a few moments, Mollymauk grabs three, uncorks all of them, and empties them into the tub, a triumphant grin on his face. Caleb shakes his head, reaching out for the basket and snagging it from Molly’s hands.

“Shall I wash your hair?” he asks, and Molly immediately smiles brightly, picking up one of the bottles and a comb while Caleb levers himself out of the pool to sit on the floor, quietly thanking any god that cares to listen that the floor tiles have been heated gently.

Molly sits on the ledge at the edge of the pool, hastily dunking his head into the water, and a moment later Caleb’s bony fingers rasp across his scalp, scented shampoo trickling down the side of his head. A moment later, the shampoo bottle is pressed into his palm, and he obediently holds on to it while Caleb carefully massages shampoo through his hair.

“I’m going to rinse now,” Caleb murmurs after a while, and Molly leans forward while Caleb sluices the shampoo out of his hair, then back again when Caleb gently tugs on one of his horns. When he tilts his head a little further back, resting his cheek on Caleb’s thigh, he finds the wizard staring down at him fondly, one eyebrow arched.

Molly blinks at him curiously, and Caleb sighs and picks up a bottle of conditioner and a comb, wiggling them meaningfully. “Alright,” Molly relents, “but you’re next.”

Caleb laughs, “Ja, alright,” he murmurs, feeling out the tangles around Molly’s horns with his fingers for a few moments before going in with the conditioner and a comb. Molly relaxes against the side of the bath, a purr rattling in his chest as Caleb carefully untangles his hair. Every few moments, Caleb gently repositions his head to get all the way through the thick hair around the root of Molly’s horns.

His fingers brush carefully against Molly’s jaw, press briefly into his temple to get him to tilt his head one way or another. At one point, Molly grabs Caleb’s wrist and presses a slow, lingering kiss to the palm of his hand, earning a soft shudder and a laugh from his lover.

Molly had daydreamed enough times about being the full focus of Caleb’s attention, but the reality is far more than what he imagined. Every touch is careful and deliberate, every scrape of the comb through his hair precise, the brush of fingers against his head and face calculated. It’s the same exquisite care with which Caleb treats everything he holds dear, and it’s not surprising, but he can’t fathom ever getting tired of these careful attentions. Little sparks of pleasure skip and zing down his spine, and his purring is probably echoing off the walls.

Caleb smiles gently down at him, picking up a particularly stubborn mat of hair and beginning to tease it out with the comb. Molly’s mouth has gone slack and soft, eyes half-closed, his tail swishing lazily under the water. Part of him still can’t fathom how Molly can still go so soft and vulnerable, leaving his skinny chest and the round scar of Lorenzo’s killing blow exposed and undefended.

But here they both are, alive, rinsing off the latest brush with danger in a bath that smells of rosemary and mint. And Caleb is the person who gets to see Molly like this, who gets to be a part of Molly appreciating his life as best he can.

Of course, there are still days where the voice telling him he doesn’t deserve this looms loud and large inside his head, the voice that sounds too much like Trent Ikithon. That he doesn’t deserve Mollymauk, good and bright and wounded, or the rest of the Nein.

Those days are less often than they used to be. Sometimes the voice is quieter. On very rare days, he does not hear it at all.

He does not say any of this. Instead he says “Rinse,” and Molly leans forward to let Caleb sluice the conditioner out of his hair.

When Caleb is satisfied, Molly levers himself out of the bath and plucks the comb from Caleb’s hands. “Your turn,” he says, like the opportunity to wash Caleb’s grimy locks is a delightful treat and not going to take more time than it is strictly worth.

He’s not going to argue, though, as he dunks himself under the water and then sits at Molly’s feet, wincing as the leather thong is removed from his hair and greasy strands brush against his shoulders.

A few moments later, Mollymauk’s hands come in to start massaging at his scalp and Caleb sighs, leaning back against the wall of the pool. He feels no need to speak now, to disturb the sound of Molly’s soft breathing and the occasional slosh of water.

“Lean over,” Molly says, and Caleb does so, watching water fall in rivulets from the ends of his hair as Molly rinses the shampoo out his hair.

“Just the ends, right?” Molly asks as Caleb sits up, and he nods.

“I have no horns for hair to matt around, so yes, just the ends.”

Molly gently thwacks his shoulder. “Don’t be rude about my magnificent rack,” he says faux-haughtily, pouring a small quantity of conditioner into the palm of his hand and beginning to comb it through Caleb’s hair.

Caleb has tuned out by the time Molly slips back into the water and into his lap, wrapping wet arms around his neck. He kisses Caleb’s brow, then the tip of his nose, while Caleb watches Molly’s tail sway back and forth under the water.

“Behave,” Caleb says, with no real rancour, before shoving Molly off his lap with a splash and a yelp. While Molly is reorienting himself, Caleb quietly climbs into the final pool, which is blessedly hot and blessedly free of both dirt and bath oils.

He sees Molly drift towards the basket again, and clears his throat. “We are meant to rinse ourselves off in this,” he says pointedly, and Molly gives him a big obnoxious “who, me?” grin, before moving to the final pool as well.

“I am very clean,” he says contentedly, “and we have a ridiculous quantity of gold, and there are still a couple of hours before we need to meet the rest of the Nein for dinner that I fully plan to spend in a comfortable bed with my favourite wizard.”

Caleb gives him a wry look. “I am sure,” he replies, “that I can find something to do so I do not interrupt you and your favourite wizard.”

“Come off it,” Molly grins, “you know you’re my favourite.”

Bizarre as it seems, he does know. Satisfied with his own cleanliness, Caleb clambers out of the bath and picks up one of the towels hanging over the rail at the edge of the room. They’re warm  and cloud-soft, and he smiles for a moment knowing how much delight Molly will derive from such a small thing.

Molly finally deigns to extract himself from the warm water when Caleb is half dressed, shaking himself like a dog. Caleb poorly conceals a smile, plucking a dry towel from the rail and draping it around Molly’s shoulders.

“Did you enjoy yourself?” Caleb asks, and Molly grins toothily and nods, using the towel to tousle his own hair and dry off his face before he takes a step forward to nuzzle into Caleb’s shoulder, one arm winding around his shoulders and tangling in his hair.

Caleb knows the cue by now. He leans down, just slightly, so Molly can kiss him. He’s spent quite a lot of time kissing Molly lately, and the crooked curve of his smiling mouth is warm and familiar. One of his hands comes up to tilt Molly’s chin up, just slightly, thumb brushing over his cheekbone.

A moment later, Molly makes a farting noise directly into his mouth and Caleb recoils, rolling up his damp towel and whipping at Molly’s legs with it. It’s too large to be effective, and he’s not really trying, but Molly makes a squawk of indignation and hops out of the way regardless, looking incredibly wounded.

“I can’t believe you just tried to towel-whip me in the dick,” Molly moans theatrically, picking up his pants and beginning to shimmy into them, “after all I’ve done for you?”

“Made a disgusting noise directly into my mouth, you mean,” Caleb says drily, beginning to buckle on his book holsters. Behind him, he hears Molly cackle.

After he’s shrugged on his coat and helped Molly struggle into his ludicrous tight pants, the two of them exit the baths. Caleb slips his hand into Molly’s without thinking about it, and the two of them set off towards their lodgings.

The rest of the Nein have split off for their own purposes, although Jester and Beau appear to have returned and are sitting at the bar, talking indistinctly. Beau wiggles her eyebrows at Molly, and he grins and makes an obscene gesture at her as he and Caleb head up the stairs.

Not always, but often enough, Caleb and Molly get to share a bed. This is one of those times. Molly sheds his coat and boots and flops on the bed, watching Caleb carefully shed his book holsters, followed by his coat.

“Caleb,” Molly says after a pause, “you’re not still wearing your binder, are you? If you are, you should take a break.”

Caleb pauses, then shakes his head, kicking off his shoes and climbing onto the bed. Molly scoots over to drape himself across Caleb’s side, one arm draped loosely over Caleb’s middle. “Hallo,” Caleb murmurs, shifting slightly to press a feather-light kiss to the corner of Molly’s mouth, one hand coming to rest on Molly’s waist.

Heat seeps through the thin fabric of his shirt, into the skin beneath. Molly has bedded a lot of people in his short time alive, but that chaste touch makes him feel warm all over. Wanting Caleb has always been a slow simmer in the background, and although having Caleb in his bed is a continual delight there are other capacities he wants Caleb in, ones he’d never considered before.

He wants Caleb’s mock-outrage as he swats at Molly, laughing, he wants the look of focus on Caleb’s face while he looks at his books, he wants Caleb worn-out and content at the end of a long night. He wants things he doesn’t know how to articulate, that he hasn’t learned how to ask for and isn’t ready to articulate.

He wants a future where he gets to watch Caleb change. The thing he misses, from all his months under the ground, is that Caleb changed while he wasn’t looking -- that there’s an interruption between the Caleb he knew then and the Caleb of now. This time, he thinks, he wants to be there to see Caleb be kinder to himself, to allow himself joy.

Caleb kisses Molly again, drawing him closer. He can hear Molly’s soft breathing, feel the steady rhythm of his heart in his chest -- here he is, alive and warm and leaning up into Caleb’s hands and mouth like they’re all he could ever want.

_ I love you _ , Caleb thinks fiercely, and does not say. There are still things he will not allow himself, and this will be one of them for a while yet.

For now, though, afternoon sun shines through the window, and Caleb and Mollymauk kiss lazily in their nest of blankets, neither of them thinking very hard about anything that isn’t the other.

 

\--fin.

 

\--

 

_ “But the loneliness never left me, I always took it with me _ __  
_ But I can put it down in the pleasure of your company _ __  
_ And there will be no grand choirs to sing, no chorus will come in _ __  
_ And no ballad will be written, tt will be entirely forgotten _ __  
__  
_ And if tomorrow it's all over, at least we had it for a moment _ __  
_ Oh, darling, things seem so unstable _ _  
_ __ But for a moment, we were able to be still.”

florence and the machine, “ _no choir_ ”

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> As always, come yell at me on tumblr @ wanderingchronicle or on the Widomauk server. :D
> 
> I hope you all enjoyed it. :)


End file.
